One of the major commuter routes from Philadelphia to the northern suburbs, the
Fort Washington Expressway has its beginnings in 1947. It was in that year
that the Philadelphia City Planning Commission drew up plans for an expressway
from Montgomery County to Interstate 95. Construction began in 1958 on a
section from PA 152 at Easton Avenue to north of Spring House. In
1959, the first section opened from PA 73 to just north of Spring House.
The remained of the route from interchange at Easton Road, originally built for
the Ten-Mile Loop Expressway, to PA 73 opened in 1960 to become
part of then US 309. Like many expressways built at the same time, the
Fort Washington Expressway suffers from short acceleration and deceleration
lanes, a lack of shoulders, and a narrow median.

Even with construction appearing to be
complete, the Planning Commission continued studies on extended the expressway
into the central part of Philadelphia through to the mid-1970s. The route
would have wound through Wyncote and North Philadelphia before intersecting US
1/Roosevelt Expressway and then heading south at Sixth Street before ending at
the cancelled Girard Avenue Expressway. The Delaware Valley Regional
Planning Commission estimated the extension to US 1 could be completed by 1975,
and then to the Girard Avenue Expressway by 1985. With construction costs
rising and a tense political environment, the southern extension faced a
difficult future. On July 1, 1977, PennDOT cancelled spending on proposed
highway projects, and in reaction to that news, the Philadelphia City Planning
Commission deleted the expressway from future spending allocations.

A
southern extension was not the only one planned for the expressway. In the
1960s, the Department of Highways planned a North Penn Expressway extension from
the northern end of the Fort Washington Expressway. The extension was
planned to continue to the northwest and connect to the Turnpike's Northeast
Extension at Lansdale. West of the interchange, the expressway
would have turned back to the northeast to connect to the southern end of the
expressway segment east of Souderton.

The talk of building an expressway alignment from Ambler north to the
Pennsylvania Turnpike-Northeast Extension at Lansdale resurfaced in 1983.
The 7.5-mile-long extension would have been built to connect northern Montgomery
County to the Philadelphia area, and relieve congestion on parallel
highways. Interchanges would have been built at PA 63, North Wales Road,
the proposed US 202 expressway, and Bethlehem Pike. The plan has not been
discussed since then.

In 1998, the Pennsylvania Department of
Transportation announced a $160 million project to rehabilitate the entire
Fort Washington Expressway. The Department of Transportation is paying 20%
of the cost, while the Federal Highway Administration is picking up the
remaining 80%. The $200 million project to improve the expressway between Cheltenham Avenue and
PA 63/Welsh Road is comprised of five
separate contracts each contract has or will move into construction between 2001 and 2003.
Two of the contracts will concentrate on construction of a reconfigured
interchange at Fort Washington, which is also the same interchange for the
Pennsylvania Turnpike. The other three are for the rebuilding of the
expressway, its bridges, overpass, and remaining interchange ramps and started
in Fall 2001. Two contracts that comprised Phase I began in Spring 2001
and 2002 that resulted in improvements to 31 intersections on key routes near
the expressway. In late 2002, work moved to the section from PA 152 to
Highland Avenue. The replacement of the interchange at PA 152 and Easton
Road will be completed in early 2005. In March 2004, reconstruction began
from PA 73 to Highland Avenue, which is slated for completion if mid-2006 and
cost $57.9 million. Construction will begin in Spring 2005 from Cheltenham
Avenue to PA 73 and in early 2006 from Highland Avenue to PA 63.The improvements to the expressway will be reconstruction of 40 bridges and
overpasses, lengthening of on and off ramps, adding new entrance and exit ramps,
adding new 12-foot-wide right shoulders and four-foot-wide left shoulders,
installation of a Jersey barrier in the median, placement of sound walls along
four miles of the expressway, upgrading of the drainage, and installation of a
Intelligent Traffic System that utilizes video cameras and variable message
signs. Project website: http://www.309online.com/.
Project hotline: 215-358-3093.

During inspections of completed bridge
decks in the project area in December 2011, hairline cracks were
discovered. It was determined that the cracks did not pose any issues to
the structural integrity, and PennDOT sealed the affected decks to prevent water
from infiltrating the concrete and lessening the lifespan of those bridges.

Planning
map showing what the PA 309/PA Turnpike interchange will look like after
construction is completed. The pink line on the right is the
collector/distributor lane for movements on and off the Fort Washington
Expressway. The green line on the left is the new segment of Pennsylvania
Avenue which will be built to provide a continuous alignment once again.
Construction of the expressway severed Pennsylvania Avenue into two
segments. (PennDOT)